I havent read all this ****... but anyway, here is my first post after.. hum... 3 years browsing these boards.

If anyone cares to hear my story from this years training camp, I'm ready to share it.

As of me, I have been a member of Fang Shen Do for something around 3 years until I quit some months ago. I first heard of it from a friend at school, telling me how great it was, how intense the classes were, and I decided to try. I was really impressed, hadn't done much martial arts in the past since i hated all that kata bullshit and stuff (i also had a lot of predjudices on most martials arts, thinking how they are useless and not adapted to the real thing... anyway).

After my first class i spoke with my soon to be sifu's assistant, a really nice guy called Mathieu who now teaches in aylmer. So I was told i could get off the membership fee if i started paying now (saving a couple of bucks) I told him to write down the prices so i could show them to my father (who paid my class these 3 years).

Back home, i looked up the fang shen do on google, finding their website as the second result (the first one being the "A former student's..." tread) I looked a bit on their (at the time) really ugly website, then went to that forum thread. So, from the start i knew about the bullshit around that school, but it somewhat made me curious and i like that first class, so i decided to subscribe for six months.

These months went on pretty well so i kept subscribing until recently. I was well into my green belt at this point, and would be at my brown belt now if i had the motivation, but i lost it all after the training camp. The camp was a good experience, as it made me realise the instructor I respected and devoted my time learning from all these years didnt deserve any of it. After the training camp i decided to keep going to the class, as i might manage to forget about it, (and because i had subscribed for like 5-6 months after that camp and wanted to use the rest of it). I saw i wasnt able to follow my instructor anymore, I wouldnt care to actually impress him anymore, i didnt want to go any further (as brownbelt also means masters club, teaching to other students all that stuff...).

Initially, i did the training camp because i planned to get brownbelt in the forecoming months.

Welcome CochiseGus. I see you have been lurking for quite some time. Yes, please do post your story from this year's training camp; I am sure many Bullies would be interested.

Over these years at FSD, i built a strong bond with my sifu. I believed in what he teached me, I would be (relatively) motivated in his classes and I wanted to get a darker belt. At some point i got green belt and my sifu started talking to me about the training camp, saying how a great thing it is and how i would never regret the 500 or so bucks it costed. I agreed to participate, since my brown belt wasn’t that far (and i wanted to confirm whether or not the stories about poop-sniffing and stuff from here were true or not, I wanted to see if i was right following this path, since I had been in doubt from the start and wanted it to end once and for all)

So I arrived at the camp with some other students from my school who gave me the ride, we dropped our stuff in the dojo where we would sleep (I chose to sleep directly on the hardwood floor, since it was only 2 nights, but some bring a mat and other stuff to accommodate themselves). outside the dojo all the sifus were talking to each other, not paying much attention to the students, waiting for everyone to arrive. At some point, we all reunited at the dojo and got our introduction to this camp. After all of that, sijo told the group to split in 4 going with different sifus, it would be our "team" for the duration of the weekend. We would compete in different activities : sort of capture the flag checkpoint race, wrestling, pulling on a string with a team on both sides (which our team didnt lose once, even though all the "big guys" were in the other teams, our sifu being the youngest of the patenaudes family, dont remember his name though. I think its sylvain). We named our team "the mosquitos" we were darn good, even thought our named was a bit funny.

To finish that first night at the training camp, sijo split the whole group in two, keeping the newbs at the dojo, ant those who already did the camp went doing so other activity we would do next day, but they did it in the night. Its called "Acrobranche" in french, maybe somebody can translate.

We noobs stayed at the dojo at did the glass walking seminar. Sijo basically talked for an hour before we could walk on two meters or so (more 6 feets) of glass. It was fun, but i think sijo shouldnt have been saying its as safe as it actually is, since i didnt fear much of it and it wasnt hard at all to walk on this short distance of broken glass. I wouldnt be surprised if somebody went running in broken glass without hurting themselves much besides a couple of cuts, as i didnt get any (actually i dont think anybody did, but some were damn stressed about it).

That was about it for that first night at the training camp. A couple of us ordered pizza before going to sleep. As of me, i played with my deck of cards for a while before getting to sleep.

I was pretty nervous in the morning and during my whole night. The dogs woke me up early, and i had many dreams where i would stay in bed and miss the run in the morning and the breakfast too. needless to say I was one of the first outside waiting for the whole thing to begin. We ran for maybe 20 minutes in the morning, then did some warm up, and went to eat breakfast.

AFter eating, we grouped near an old tree (which was cut, im sorry, im not english and dont know the term, but writing this, i found the word tree stump faraway in my head) So we gathered around that tree stump, sijo starting to speak about the importance of symbolism in our everyday lives, how we have to find things that motivate us in our way, things that have a meaning to us. He told us we should find a symbol for this weekend, something thatd be strong enough to keep it with us the rest of our live. we had to find that symbol and leave it by the tree stump. People were allowed to grab anything they wanted on the property as a symbol, toys from the children, rocks, or stuff that belonged to them too. I didnt have any clue what would represent this weekend as i didnt experience it yet. I chose not to leave anything on that tree stump. I dont know if my sifu or the other teacehrs noticed. I decided i would leave something there by then end of the weekend.

After the altar, we did a rather though training, even though some students were just trying to do it as fast as they could, often skipping reps, which resulted in me being unable to keep up (and even my sifu) at some point, he stopped the whole thing saying to the group how pussies they were and how they have to do the requested number instead of faking it, then he went on doing pushups and other exercise at a REALIST rythm. I was very grateful to him, since he had the actual guts to tell that whole group and the other sifus how wrong they were and it gave me the time to do all the exercises (since i could never finish before we started another)

We then went on doing activities the whole day. Ive been told the training camp had been softened a lot by other students who did it many times. The 500 push up, 10000 chung choies, 500 squats and stuff isnt true anymore. I bet most people would fake half of them anyway, so i didnt mind that at all.

After supper, we were invited to meet at the barn for some sparring. I had heard stories from the barn before, students from different schools getting pretty aggressive in some sort of "king of the hill" pattern were the winner keeps fighter new opponents until he is dethroned, all of that fighting taking place on a hard cement floor. This time i was really nervous about it. I stayed near the people of my school, who gathered in a corner not far from my sifu. Sijo was in the opposite corner of the twice long as its wide room.

I dont think sijo said anything before we starting sparring, actually i think he stayed silent for a long while during the first half of this barn activity. There was three fights going on at all time. Sometimes the sifus would go and the center and ask for students to come against them. I did a lot of times, i wanted to use that opportunity they gave us to learn from them, and they were grateful to me for it, and helped me out as much as they could in my fighting (which is rather clumsy, as my reflexes are probably the worst on this earth, and i never get really involved when i practice fighting, maybe because im lazy).

At some point, sijo stopped all fights and told everyone to get back to the sides and sit down. He started talking about how his bloodline was exclusively composed of tough guys, street fighters, bullies, all that stuff. He made a good point, saying how the barn is important in his eyes, since it’s a tradition in his family. Then he started complaining about some of the students out there who were staying on the side and not participating, as if they were better than everyone here, as if they could beat all of his students and didnt care to go in the center and fight. he was really aggressive in his body language, and his words were more often than not loaded with that same anger. At this point in started wondering if the water in his bottle really was water and not some strong alcohol (seeing his face every time he took a sip, i wouldn't be surprising if he was completely drunk at the time he made this speech). He kept going until some point, where he started to shout at a student, running at him. faking to punch him, the saying how HE isnt respectful to all of us and how HE is the one who think he's better then everyone. Then he left this student and started harassing a second one, saying that he is no better, and that he deserve to get beaten up to death. He kept shouting at them for a couple of minutes, then he calmed down. He kept talking at a slower pace about this whole barn thing before he ordered that we continue the fighting.

I was glad all of this was finished. To lighten my conscience, i told myself all of this was an act to motivate those who didnt participate, and maybe it was, so i kept fighting as i did before that speech, i matched with other student (who took that thing all too seriously to my taste) so i the end, i only matched with sifus. I remember a really fun match with sifu Alain, who didnt treat me too lightly, but who also let me stay in the spar. I also had a really amusing fight with sifu Brian, who basically tried to teach me stuff as if i had never sparred. He made a bit of fun of me because i couldn't kick him in the abs with my round house "My abs, not my butt!" he said. I laughed with him, so did the other students (sifu Brian is rather tall, and i can’t kick really high, so the humour was appropriate).

A couple of minutes after sijo finished his speech, my sifu went to the center so other students could match him. i chose not to as i always had the chance to do it at our school, so i left this opportunity to the other students. He proposed to the student sijo had shouted at and intimidated to have a little spar. I didnt pay much attention to this particular fight, as there were some more interesting ones back there (3 fight at a time, and this happened to be less interesting that the others). But at some point, my sifu was on a full mount of the student, and was hitting pretty rough on him. He stopped hitting him to let him recover a bit and standed up. The student kept sparring with a lot of energy, although he wasnt good at all. At this point all i watched was this one wight, since i never saw my sifu be so aggressive in any fight with our own students in the past, and i was quite intrigued by this. They kept having a more or less fair spar until the student got some hard round house kick in the head. He fell on the ground but managed to keep my sifu in his guard on the ground (which was too weak to do him any good anyway). My sifu hit him a couple of time, then grabbed his head and removed the students helmet. The student tried to grab it and put it on, but he couldnt get a hold on it since my sifu had thrown it. He tried to protect his head but he took a few good hits, his head banging on the cement on everyone of them. After another 4-5 seconds of beating., he starting crying for it to stop, my sifu gave him another three or four shot, then stood up, saying in a childish yet psychopathic way "I could have killed you!". the student (His name was rubbens, i just remembered. I had a good chat with his during that day as we did the acrobranche thing together. He was some french immigrant, a rally nice guy to know) managed to crawl back to the side. Immediately after, my sifu was begging the other student (the second one sijo shouted at) to come have a spar with him. He was trying really hard to convince him with replies like "it’s just kidding", "i won’t hurt you", stuff like that. Student refused to spar, tried to keep cool, but seeing his expression, i knew he saw the whole thing (actually, i think the four other people who were fighting stopped fighting too when Rubbens took his beating. I would be surprised if anyone in the barn didnt acknowledge it)

soon after, we were all out of the barn, and sijo had a talk with the two students. I didnt try to eavesdrop any of that, i wasnt in the mood at the time either. There was a campfire late that night, i went to it for half an hour or so and returned to the dojo soon after. Back in there, rubbens was crying in the dark and the other student (whom i dont remember the name) was in his bed, not sleeping at all. I myself managed to get into sleep rather easily, i was pretty exhausted from that day; plus it was my last night sleeping on hard wood so i wanted the best of it.

next morning during the breakfast, i overheard a conversation between rubbens and sifu Martin (probably his sifu). Rubbens was in tears in front of his instructor. He told him he was leaving the camp, and leaving kung-fu once and for all. Martin was obsiously trying to keep him hooked up, telling him how empty his life would be without it, how this is part of him and how good this is for him.

After breakfast i returned to the dojo and saw rubbens packing up his stuff. I hopped he wouldnt only leave the camp, and do himself a favor not ever returning to a fsd school. I grabbed my deck of card and took out the deuce of space. i had found my symbol. This is what i left at the altar in training camp, the worst card in my deck. i chose keep doing classes after this, but only until my subscription was over. until then, maybe i would chose to subscribe again if i felt i could pardon my sifu, but i didnt.

During the day, sifu Martin though us some weapon drills. He took my sifu as a partner for demonstrating. I could see my sifu try and hide his pain when sifu martin showed the take downs and submissions with his kalis. he was obviously trying to teach his a small lesson for that couple of hundreds less in his yearly revenue.

I hope you guys have fun reading this. This is the tale from a student who knew about bullshido from the start and who chose do try FSD anyhow, and even got hooked up to it. My sifu helped me learn my greatest lesson in life : see by yourself, but dont expect anybetter.

By the way, anybody knows great schools around Ottawa for martial arts? I’d like to do some good sparring, and get better at it. i want something realistic, not only kicks or punches or only both... i want a teacher i can trust and respect too. I read about some sanda classes at Carleton, with Sifu John Hum. Anybody knows about that?

Thanks for posting your story CochiseGus. First thing - If you would like people on Bullshido to help you find another martial school then you should start a new post in Newbietown Newbietown - No BS Martial Arts.

If any other interesting stories come to mind please share. One thing I am curious about is how often is the term 'MMA' or 'Mixed Martial Arts' used by the Sifus in Fang Shen Do?

At some point, sijo stopped all fights and told everyone to get back to the sides and sit down. He started talking about how his bloodline was exclusively composed of tough guys, street fighters, bullies, all that stuff. He made a good point, saying how the barn is important in his eyes, since it’s a tradition in his family. Then he started complaining about some of the students out there who were staying on the side and not participating, as if they were better than everyone here, as if they could beat all of his students and didnt care to go in the center and fight. he was really aggressive in his body language, and his words were more often than not loaded with that same anger. At this point in started wondering if the water in his bottle really was water and not some strong alcohol (seeing his face every time he took a sip, i wouldn't be surprising if he was completely drunk at the time he made this speech). He kept going until some point, where he started to shout at a student, running at him. faking to punch him, the saying how HE isnt respectful to all of us and how HE is the one who think he's better then everyone. Then he left this student and started harassing a second one, saying that he is no better, and that he deserve to get beaten up to death. He kept shouting at them for a couple of minutes, then he calmed down. He kept talking at a slower pace about this whole barn thing before he ordered that we continue the fighting.

Originally Posted by CochiseGus

A couple of minutes after sijo finished his speech, my sifu went to the center so other students could match him. i chose not to as i always had the chance to do it at our school, so i left this opportunity to the other students. He proposed to the student sijo had shouted at and intimidated to have a little spar. I didnt pay much attention to this particular fight, as there were some more interesting ones back there (3 fight at a time, and this happened to be less interesting that the others). But at some point, my sifu was on a full mount of the student, and was hitting pretty rough on him. He stopped hitting him to let him recover a bit and standed up. The student kept sparring with a lot of energy, although he wasnt good at all. At this point all i watched was this one wight, since i never saw my sifu be so aggressive in any fight with our own students in the past, and i was quite intrigued by this. They kept having a more or less fair spar until the student got some hard round house kick in the head. He fell on the ground but managed to keep my sifu in his guard on the ground (which was too weak to do him any good anyway). My sifu hit him a couple of time, then grabbed his head and removed the students helmet. The student tried to grab it and put it on, but he couldnt get a hold on it since my sifu had thrown it. He tried to protect his head but he took a few good hits, his head banging on the cement on everyone of them. After another 4-5 seconds of beating., he starting crying for it to stop, my sifu gave him another three or four shot, then stood up, saying in a childish yet psychopathic way "I could have killed you!". the student (His name was rubbens, i just remembered. I had a good chat with his during that day as we did the acrobranche thing together. He was some french immigrant, a rally nice guy to know) managed to crawl back to the side. Immediately after, my sifu was begging the other student (the second one sijo shouted at) to come have a spar with him. He was trying really hard to convince him with replies like "it’s just kidding", "i won’t hurt you", stuff like that. Student refused to spar, tried to keep cool, but seeing his expression, i knew he saw the whole thing (actually, i think the four other people who were fighting stopped fighting too when Rubbens took his beating. I would be surprised if anyone in the barn didnt acknowledge it)

By the way, anybody knows great schools around Ottawa for martial arts? I’d like to do some good sparring, and get better at it. i want something realistic, not only kicks or punches or only both... i want a teacher i can trust and respect too. I read about some sanda classes at Carleton, with Sifu John Hum. Anybody knows about that?

If Kyokushin interests you, the Goudreault Dojo might fit the bill. Google "Kyokushin Ottawa" for the exact schedule and address (they've moved since I trained there a few years ago).

...
this location is the only one offering "MMA" type training as far as i can tell.

The flyers I found in the movie theater indicate that there will be more than one school offering MMA training soon, if they are not already.

Unless the game is really stepped up from when I was there, I would still be pretty comfortable pitting pure BJJ against the vast majority of Fangers, but who knows. Brian P in Montreal did have the balls to step up, and does have some first hand knowledge of what's available, so maybe he's coming around. Did anyone find out who the instructor was teaching Jiu Jitsu at the mtl school?

Just to confirm one point of what Gus had to say: I did attend one of the earlier camps (maybe around '94?) and on the second day, during a pause in the drills while we were all standing at attention in rows, jp (sifu, at the time) was lecturing the group and I was looking down for a few seconds. I heard him yelling at someone, angry words, and as I looked up saw him working his way quickly through the group and coming straight at me. I was lined up near the center of the group. I just stood still and kept my arms at my sides. He threw a bunch hands at my face but didn't actually strike me - yelling about being serious and paying attention all the while.

It did seem to re-energize the group, at least for a while. It was late on the second day and we were all pretty tired. He did come over and apologize to me later saying that it was nothing personal, that he just wanted to "wake the group up". I apologized to him for not paying full attention during his lecture.

So it would appear that closing on an unattentive student is a standard technique for re-gaining the attention of the group.